What President Barack Obama Has Accomplished

As November 6th, 2012 is fast approaching, I think that it is important to remind voters of the long list of accomplishments made by President Barack Obama. With that said, I am providing a brief list of the Obama Administration’s accomplishments. The list of accomplishments that appear on the Obama Reelection Campaign are as follows:

1. Fair Pay Act
2. Recovery Act
3. Middle Class Tax Cuts
4. Auto Industry Bailout
5. Financial Aid
6. Student Loan Reform
7. American Opportunity Tax Credit
8. Raise Academic Standards
9. Lifted Millions Out of Poverty:

• • The first bill President Obama signed was the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act, to help women fight back when they don’t get equal pay for equal work.
  • His Recovery Act supported millions of jobs and helped to stave off a second Great Depression.
  • He pushed for and won middle class tax cuts that benefited every American worker, and saved the typical family $3,600 in taxes over the last four years.
  • President Obama rescued the auto industry,  and now GM and Chrysler are healthier than they’ve ever been. The  American auto industry has added nearly a quarter of a million jobs since June 2009—and they most likely wouldn’t exist right now without  President Obama’s leadership.
  • President Obama doubled funding for Pell Grants, helping to make college more affordable  for nearly 10 million families.
  President Obama student loan reform ended billions in subsidies to banks serving as middlemen and reinvested those savings directly in students.
  • The President established the American Opportunity Tax Credit, worth up to $10,000 over four years of college.
  • His Race to the Top Initiative helped spur nearly every state to raise academic standards.
  • His tax cuts, social-welfare programs, and economic policies lifted nearly 7 million Americans above the federal poverty line in 2010.

10. Tax Cuts For Small Businesses:

 President Obama has signed 18 tax cuts for small businesses since taking office.

11. Millions Of New Private Sector Jobs

We’ve seen 5.2 million new private sector jobs  over the last 31 months.

12. Unemployment Rate

The unemployment rate is at the lowest level since President Obama took office.

13. Health Care Reform

Health care reform—passed after decades of failed attempts by every previous president—provides affordable health coverage to every American and will lower premiums by an average of $2,000 per family by 2019.

14. Increased Access to Health Care

Obamacare expanded access to lifesaving preventive care such as cancer screenings and immunizations with no out-of-pocket costs for 54 million Americans.

15. Ends Insurance Discrimination

Obamacare ends insurance discrimination against the 129 million Americans with pre-existing conditions.

16. Increased Access to Health Care:

Because of Obamacare, over 3 million more young  adults have health insurance today than would if the new law hadn’t passed.

17. Pre-Existing Conditions

 The parents of over 17 million children with pre-existing conditions no longer have to worry that their children will be denied coverage.

18. Overhaul Of Federal Government Regulations

President Obama has ordered the overhaul of  federal government  regulations to make them smarter, practical, and more efficient. Just a fraction of these common-sense initiatives will help save businesses $10 billion in the next five years alone.

19. Investments In Clean Energy:

His historic investments in clean energy have helped more than double the amount of electricity we obtain from wind and solar sources and helped increase biofuel production to its highest level in history.

20. Doubling Fuel Efficiency Standards

President Obama is doubling fuel efficiency standards, which will save drivers more than $8,000 at the  gas pump, not to mention lessen the impact of automobiles on our environment.

21. Climate Change

President Obama has taken unprecedented action to address climate change,  reaching historic international agreements to curb carbon emissions, and taking action here at home to reduce carbon pollution from our vehicles and promote clean energy production.

22. Environmental Protections

He has taken historic action to protect our environment—signing one of the largest expansions of protected wilderness in a generation and putting in place standards to reduce toxic air pollution that will save thousands of lives.

23. Wall Street Reform

President Obama fought for and won landmark Wall Street reform that reins in the abuses that led to the financial crisis and ends the era of taxpayer bailouts and “too big to fail.”

24. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau

Wall Street reform created the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the nation’s first federal agency focused solely on consumer financial protection—and        the Bureau is already protecting families from unfair and abusive financial practices from Wall Street banks and shadowy corners of the financial industry.

25. Increased US Government Transparency

As part of President Obama’s commitment to transparency, the White House has posted its visitor records online for the first time ever.

26. Cut US Dependence on Foreign Oil

President Obama’s all-of-the-above approach to energy has helped cut the United States’ dependence on foreign oil to its lowest level in 20 years.

27. Ended The War In Iraq

President Obama responsibly ended the war in Iraq.

1. War In Afghanistan

He announced a plan to end the war in Afghanistan and transition security responsibility to the Afghan people.

29. Security Assistance Package To Israel

President Obama sent the largest security assistance package to Israel in history and funded the Iron Dome system, which is protecting Israeli homes and schools from rocket attacks.

30. Sanctions on Iran

President Obama rallied the international community to implement the toughest sanctions on Iran in history.

31. Veterans Affairs Funding

Through the President’s historic increases in Veterans Affairs funding, he has expanded and improved healthcare and job training access for our returning veterans.

32. New START Treaty

President Obama negotiated the New START Treaty with Russia to reduce the number of nuclear  weapons in both countries. At the same time, he also secured commitments from dozens of other countries to lock down nuclear materials.

33. Service members

His administration naturalized 11,146 military service members as U.S. citizens in 2010; more than in any year since 1955.

34. NASA

President Obama set a bold new plan for the future of NASA space exploration, using the skill and ability of the private sector for short trips to the International Space Station, while building a new vehicle for exploration of distant space, and doing everything in his power to support the economy on Florida’s Space Coast.

35. Tourism

President Obama recognizes that tourism is one of America’s largest economic engines; he’s worked to encourage international visitors come here, maintaining our security while keeping millions of Americans in good, paying jobs.

36. DOMA

He has affirmed his personal support of marriage equality, directed the Justice Department to stop defending DOMA in federal courts, and took the practical and compassionate step of extending hospital visitation rights to same-sex partners.

37. “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”: He fought for and won the repeal of “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell”, allowing gay and lesbian members of the military to serve openly for the first time in history.

38. Immigration System

When Congress failed to fix our broken immigration system, his administration did everything in its power to improve it, streamlining the legal immigration process and announcing a policy that lifts the shadow of deportation from hard working young immigrants brought to the U.S. as children.

39. Osama Bin Laden:

Oh, and he gave the order to send troops in after Osama Bin Laden—and has decimated al Qaeda’s senior leadership.

 

Take action that can and will change the future. On November 6, 2012, seize the opportunity to cast your vote.

As was aptly stated by President Johnson when discussing the Voting Rights Act of 1965, “The vote is the most powerful instrument ever devised by man for breaking down injustice and destroying the terrible walls which imprison men because they are different from other men.”

Each election day, countless eligible voters deprive themselves of their voting right through complacency or apathy. Don’t be among them—exercise your right to vote.

Source: Obama website. List created by Lauren on October 31, 2012. Forward. Wikipedia

Photo Credit: Microsoft Clip Art